Weird Al's Song of Love

 "Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice" Ephesians 4.13

Soon it it'll be time to  "celebrate" Valentine's Day again and I decided to go through a rigorous analysis of the metaphors in Weird Al's unique ode to love, "One More Minute" Please consider this is a love song parody, and should be taken lightheartedly. If you are familiar with Weird Al's work, you'll know what I mean.If you have recently been dumped,or re-re-dumped,I would suggest prayer and fasting and connecting with someone who truly cares about your feelings...............In other words DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. If you've ever had a bad breakup you will be able to relate.

The song begins with a straightforward accounting of the recent events in Weird Al's life

Well, I heard that you're leavin' Gonna leave me far behind 'Cause you found a brand new love,You decided that I'm not your kind.
So I pulled your name out of my Rolodex and I tore all your pictures in two and I burned down the malt shop where we used to go.Just because it reminds me of you. Poor Al seems to be willing to suffer for this relationship. As a resident of California, his act of arson is subject to between three and eight years in jail. But there's no metaphor at issue yet.

That's right, you ain't gonna see me cryin' I'm glad that you found somebody new 'Cause I'd rather spend eternity eating shards of broken glass. Than spend one more minute with you

Now things get more interesting. Obviously, Al isn't going to live forever,(unless he is born again,which seems unlikely at the time of his writing this song) but we can reasonably interpret "eternity" to mean "the rest of his life". So how much glass would Al eat in his lifetime?

The average American lifespan is around 77 years, and the song came out when Al was 26, so we're looking at 51 years of eating glass. Typical human stomachs range in capacity from 1.5 to 4 liters. If we assume that Al eats three square meals of broken glass each day, and that each meal comes in at the low end of capacity, that's 4.5 liters per day, or 256,230 liters of glass in his lifetime. How many bottles would Al have to smash to get that glass? Let's figure that a 16-oz. bottle (roughly 0.57 liters) can be shattered into glass representing about half as much volume, or 0.285 liters, meaning that Al will need 899,052 typical soda bottles to meet his commitment. Let's hope he can buy them wholesale! or not.

I guess I might seem kinda bitter You got me feelin' down in the dumps'cause I'm stranded all alone in the Gas Station of Love and I have to use the self-service pumps

If Al is stranded at the self-service pumps, assuming he drives a car with about 20 mpg fuel economy, and

does about 15,000 miles per year, with an 18 gallon gas tank (assuming he fills up every time he hits 16 gallons), he'll fill up 46.9 (call it 47) times. Assuming he saves about $0.30/gallon by not using the full-service pumps, he'll pocket $281.Lets just pray his his sake and ours that the gas prices level out. So this doesn't work out badly for him -- actually, it's just about perfect.

Oh, so honey, let me help you with that suitcase.You ain't gonna break my heart in two' cause I'd rather get a hundred thousand paper cuts on my face,Than spend one more minute with you

Talk about getting rid of baggage.The paper cuts sound painful, but it's not much of a sacrifice on Al's part. How much blood do we get out of a paper cut? This proved hard to estimate, Since it draws about 0.3 micro liters, we'll guess a paper cut comes in at about 0.5 micro liters. If Al gets 100,000 paper cuts on his face, and each one bleeds out .5 micro liters, he'll bleed about .05 liters. A standard unit of blood for transfusion is 495 mL, so since Al has only lost about 1/10 the amount of blood needed for a transfusion, the odds are good he'll live through this one and just need a ton of batman band-aids.

I'd rather rip out my intestines with a fork,Than watch you going out with other men.I'd rather slam my fingers in a door,Again and again and again and again and again

As for ripping out his intestines with a fork, the procedure is called seppuku.It involves a sword called a wakizasi which has a blade about 20 inches long, roughly three times the length of typical forks so if Al tries to commit seppuku with a fork --- he's in a lot of trouble. This may be his intent -- since Al doesn't mention having a second, he's probably trying to commit jumonji-giri which is an enhanced version that's even more painful than the standard version.Slamming fingers is not that big a deal...it hurts less than a broken heart....Lets continue.......

I'd rather have my blood sucked out by leeches.Shove an ice pick under a toenail or two...

The leech issue is complicated, because it can depend on two fairly divergent measurements of how much blood a leech can suck out. An article from the Journal of Rehabilitation Research and Development indicates that a leech can suck about 4.7 mL over 3 hours, or roughly 1.6 mL/hour. But another article, admittedly a more popular-science treatment of leeches in medicine, suggests that the correct figure is more like 15-30 mL over a period ranging from 20 minutes to an hour. At an average of 14-18 pints of blood per human adult, it would take one leech (working on 16 pints, or 7.5 liters), about 4687 hours to completely drain Al. Assuming Al doesn't eat or drink anything, since loss of 30% of blood volume can lead to

irreversible shock, it will take the leech about 1406 hours, or 58 days, to finish Al off. He'd die of thirst in just 15 days, though, so 4 leeches would be needed for the job. To do it in one day, he'd need 60 leeches, and at $4.75 a pop, that would mean Al would need to add just $4 to the money he saved from using the self-service pumps at the Gas Station of Love. So he shouldn't act on this for at least a year.

Actually, once the leech gorges itself (according to the pop-science article), it's done eating for up to 18 months while it digests, slowly. Assuming reasonably that 30% of blood volume works out to 2,250 mL, or 150 leeches. Which means he'll really need to spend about 2 1/2 years at the gas station to save up the money for his continued act of love,during which time he might reconsider.As far as the icepick is concerned,that could really hurt depending on which little piggy Weird Al decides to assault.

I'd rather clean all the bathrooms in Grand Central Station with my tongue,Than spend one more minute with you 
This always sounded to me like the second-most impressive claim in the song (trailing only the grand finale), but the truth appears to be far more depressing -- it's actually not nearly that much of a sacrifice. According to an article on toilets at Grand Central Terminal ,there are only 32 ladies' stalls, and 6 men's stalls, in the public area, plus 4 more of each in private areas which can be hired out for receptions according to a FAQ a the GCT website. Having said that, the only bathroom listings shown in the GCT web site's directory are on the lower dining concourse, just like the article said was the case prior to the remodeling job it discusses, so it's entirely possible that these figures are accurate. Admittedly, 46 toilets is 46 more than Al is willing to clean with his own tongue, but the lyrics make it sound like we're talking about several hundred.It would be far more impressive if he tried this at Wrigley Field during April or Soldier field during mid December.

Yes, I'd rather jump naked on a huge pile of thumbtacks Or stick my nostrils together with Krazy Glue,I'd rather dive into a swimming pool filled with double-edged razor blades Than spend one more minute with you

How many thumbtacks could get stuck in Al if he jumped into said pile? Well, Al is 6' 0" (from his website), and 170 pounds, so we'll figure that he's got a waist size of about 32", Treating Al as a cylinder, which has a surface area of 2*pi*r*^2 + 2*pi*r*h, and dropping the first term since he doesn't really end in neat circles, we get a rough surface area of 7234 square inches. We'll take off about 20% to deal with deviations from non-cylindricality, for about 5780 square inches. Thumbtacks come in a range of sizes, from 5/16" to 1/2" heads. We'll go with the 5/16" size, assume no overlap, and also assume that he gets completely covered with tacks from rolling around after the initial impact, which means that at 0.31 square inches per thumbtack, Al will be on the receiving end of 18,645 thumbtacks, which works out to $658 worth using the nice nickel-plated ones .That's at $3.53 per box.Sticking the nostrils together with Krazy glue just means Al would not be able to blow his nose for a while so its the less of his sacrifice for love.

So how many razors it would take to fill Al's hypothetical swimming pool? A standard Olympic-sized swimming pool runs 50 meters by 25 meters by 2 meters, or 2500 cubic meters. Browsing the web for straight razor dimensions yields mostly dimensions specified in terms of cases, not blades, but reasonable figures seem to be about six inches long, two inches wide, and a half-inch thick, which means that at .0034 cubic feet per blade, or .00009 cubic meters, it would take 25.4 million blades to fill the pool.

And finally, the ultimate act of self-destruction, Al's concludes:

I'd rather rip my heart right out of my rib cage with my bare hands,And then throw it on the floor and stomp on it 'til I die

We can't really speculate on how many stomps Al would get, but we know that you can rip a man's heart out of their rib cage and have it continue to beat, as documented in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, where the act was performed by Mola Ram.

Weird Al has helped us to see that being miserable for love can be quite expensive, and fairly painful to boot. So make sure you keep Christ at the center of your relationship and give your significant other a hug today, (if you have one) and you will thank them for saving you several thousand dollars in leeches, thumbtacks, and razor blades....not to mention attorney's fees and jail time. Then take them to your nearest El station to thank them for saving you from having to clean the place. The moral to this song is to get Better not bitter.... Practice Forgiveness because Bitterness will leave you in pain and cost you plenty.Trust God's healing Love to make you better.....So will it be a Happy Valentine's Day????

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres"

PB-

MOTIVATIONAL MONDAY! Merry Merry,Quite Contrary

“It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again…” (Luke 15:32)

There is a segment of the people that are threatened by good news. They are jealous of others’ blessings. You get a raise in pay, they get a raise in blood pressure. If you’re merry they’re contrary. Scrooge was like that in the Dickens classic.The elder brother was like that when his little brother returned from the pig pen. When he heard about the ring, the robe, the roast and the rejoicing, “he was angry, and would not go in…” (vs 28) He gave the news-bearer a piece of his mind, then his father. Afterwards, his head was a little emptier! Dad tried to reason with him, that it was fitting to make merry because “thy brother was dead, and is alive again; was lost, and is found”. Forget reasoning, It has been said "hurting people hurt people". His feelings were hurt. He didn’t want a party, he wanted pity party. I’m not offering him any, not from this Pastor.

 AreWhy “merry”? Christmas time is upon us! We have cause to be merry, not contrary. Solomon made several positive statements – “A merry heart makes a cheerful countenance…” (Proverbs 15:13) “…he that is of a merry heart has a continual feast” (15:15) So keep flying your flags of discontent and go hungry. “A merry heart does good like a medicine…” (17:22) James asked, “Is any merry? Let him sing psalms” (James 5:13). you merry? Vance Havner said, “Pity the Christian that claims to be living in the land of Canaan, with figs and pomegranates, when all he has to show for it are crab apples!” Merry or contrary? The decision is yours, like the old Sixties song shares – “It’s my party I can…laugh if I want to!” (Yea, I changed the wording.) Elder brother thought the prodigal needed to grovel a little. He recommended probation; let the little waster prove himself for a few months. Instead the father was all hugs and kisses when he met him. I know a few stiff shirts like that. To them affection never makes sense and you'll never make merry if you remain contrary.While the younger was turning up the praise, the elder was turning up his nose. You can still find hard heads like that and contrary attitudes in churches today.Their life stinks and they need to find a pew.

Merry is very. It is an attitude with altitude. True, it can be misused. Two signs of Noah’s day, they were “eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage…” (Matthew 24:38) That’s marrying and merrymaking. The rich fool said to his inner man, “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry” and that moral looseness cost him his soul (Luke 12:19,20). But just because some carry merry or marry too far doesn’t infer that God places a premium on the person that looks like he was baptized in pickle juice. Happy people glorify God much sooner than do sorry sour sickly sad-sacks. (Now say that 100 times!) Someone said a grouch spreads cheer wherever he doesn’t go. I don’t want the single adjective that best describes me to be contrary. Hugh Downs said, “A happy person is not a person with a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes”. The merry-heart goes farther in business, relationships, church, home and even living with one’s own self. I truly do wish you a merry Christmas…the kind that makes you roll on the floor doing a belly laugh. It’s all right, the bible said it is good for the cardio-vascular......


Nuff Said!

WONDERFUL WEDNESDAY!!!!!!!! "Christmas Cookies"

…great joy…“Fear not…good tidings all people…unto you…this day…a Savior…the Lord” (Luke 2:10,11)

What I like about these verses is how the words come in cute little cookies…Christmas cookies. The angel appears saying, “Fear not”. Phobia ends where the Christ-life begins. His birth invaded darkness with light chasing the shadows away. Fear of man, fear of death, fear of cataclysm or criticism, all fear is vanquished by the incarnation. Some are afraid to fly, afraid to buy, afraid to die, afraid to try. But Christmas is the powerful statement that He will now and forever be “God with us” (Matthew 1:23). The next "cookie" says “good tidings”, Euangellizo, in the Greek, “evangelism” or the preaching of Good News. We’ve heard enough bad news on the six o’clock report, haven’t we? Enough bad chidings. It’s time for some good tidings! The message for this Messy Age is that God is a good God and He offers good news.

Then note that “good” leads to “great”, for the next cookie says, “great joy”. Isaac Watts echoed Gabriel’s annunciation with “Joy to the world, the Lord is come!” Note, the Lord “is” come. Our text declares, “…unto you is born this day a Savior”, just as a later a verse says that He “is” risen. Jesus “is”, not “was”. Christmas isn’t as much historical as it is experiential. B.C. and A.D. are not just dating methods from the distant past. They are experiences in the present. Everyone who receives the Christ of Christmas has a before and after testimony. Christmas is the pivot point of all history but also of the individual heart. no one is so good that they don’t need saved nor so bad that they can’t be saved. "This joy is “to all people”, all laos in Greek, the laity. It is a “whosoever will” equal opportunity.(Acts 2.39) we  rejoice that “the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him” (Romans 10:12). Luke, the only Gentile writer in the Bible, makes special note that salvation was not only for the lost sheep of the house of Israel but for “all” people.

The next cookie, “unto you” is born a Savior. Yes you! Be exceeding glad. The net thrown out to catch “all” has long enough ropes to reach even you. You haven’t sinned so grossly that God has given up on you. Christmas is proof. By saying “unto you” he implies that what is universalized must now be personalized. Each individual must receive Jesus. He must be born in the foul smelly stable of our heart. And when? The next says “this day”. “This is the day the Lord hath made”, said the Psalmist. “Today I must abide at your house”, said Christ to Zaccheus. Today is the day of salvation. Tomorrow is a date on a fool’s calendar. Next He is called “a Savior” and finally “the Lord”. It is a package deal; He is a Lord that saves and is to be the Savior that lords. In the new birth, which Christmas typifies, we do accept Him as Savior, but this verse implies that God expects us, at the same time, to also receive Him as Lord. He is “born” Lord. In the new birth, the “born again” experience, He becomes Lord from the beginning. There is no plan or option for receiving Jesus on an installment plan, today Savior, tomorrow Christ, next month Lord. It ultimately must be all or nothing, Lord of all or else not Lord at all. Is Jesus Lord in your life? Don’t leave Him as a plastic doll in a manger at the church Christmas play. Instead, seat Him on the throne...................And have some cookies.............

Nuff Said,

How Do You Spot a Counterfeit?

So how do you spot a counterfeit? Our U.S. government estimates that less than 0.01% of U.S. paper currency in circulation is counterfeit. This small number is due in large part to the bills' security features, which are hard to reproduce but easy to verify.They train their Agents how to spot the authentic because In every case when you know what's real,you'll be a spot the fake.
They give us 3 ways to spot a counterfeit,lets apply some of those principle's to help us identify Counterfeit Christianity.

1.Counterfeit money will often feel distinctly different from authentic money.Christians are meant to be distinctly different than the world.If Your Christianity is based on sacrifice and good works rather than obedience,Holiness,and separation than it's a good bet Satan is faking you out.We are called to be salt and light,not sugar and spice.

2.Genuine money is often thinner than counterfeit money.----The Christlike walk is narrow and one of self denial.Jesus said In Matthew 7.14 strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it" Compromise,ignoring God's word regarding sin is widening the way to a Godless road.Jesus said of the pharisees Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.(Matthew 23.15) Be careful of any denomination that affirms a safe place for sin and turns the narrow into a four lane super highway.

3.Denominations of bills will look different, so get a note of the same amount.---Well whats the difference you might asked? All of Christianity is the same isn't it? Friend it isn't. More than ever Evangelical Denominations are distinguishing themselves by omitting the truth of scripture and making allowances for sin.The counterfeit Christianity of today's culture is lowering the bar of God's holiness,ignoring the centrality of God's word.Compare the denomination in question with that of scriptural truth,not man made tradition.


Well Known Christian Author Dr Michael Brown put's it this way"You don’t have to look too far today to hear Christian leaders teaching that it’s wrong to expect born-again believers to change their conduct, calling those who do “religious” (as if that’s a bad word) or, worse still, “legalistic” if they preach repentance to the church and to the lost. Today, you can practice almost any sin and still be considered a christian" The enemy has deceived us into a powerless walk-- ".Having a form of Godliness but denying the power"-(2 Timothy 3.5)


Remember, a compromised Gospel produces compromised fruit,A counterfeit Gospel a counterfeit Christian.The true Gospel is about transformation not affirmation,fearing God and walking in obedience to his word.Satan is doing more harm as an angel of light by vomiting out a doctrine of love and acceptance than he has ever done as as roaring lion,so be sober,stay vigilant because In every case when you able to recognize what's real,it doesn't take much to spot a fake.

PB

TERRIFIC TUESDAY! Harvey Two Face?

Psalm 119:113 (Moffatt)
“I hate men who are half and half…”

Jesus is either Lord of all or He’s not Lord at all. We’ve quoted that before but it is only part true for there are areas in most believers’ lives that aren’t yet totally yielded to Him.Harvey Two-Face is of course a Batman villain.Harvey Dent, District Attorney for Gotham City is touched by tragedy when acid burns away half of his face,thus scarring him and splitting his personality.The duality he struggles with rides on the flip of a two headed scarred coin.As he does with any villain, Batman looks to find the good in Harvey and help him in his struggle to be free from the dark side of his split.Our Lord still loves us despite any lack of sincerity or double mindedness we emit.Despite our being split down the center at times,God waits patiently for us to decide. David, on the other hand, isn’t as merciful. He said, “I hate the half and half”. What a strong word, but it is used often in relation to sin. “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil” (Proverbs 8:13). “Hate the evil, and love the good” (Amos 5:15). I don’t think we can interpret that David hated the person, but that he hated the attitude, the spirit behind the person. The old version translates it, “I hate vain thoughts” (KJV). “Vain” there is italicized, added by the translators, so it should read simply, “I hate thoughts”, plural, implying uncontrolled thoughts, thoughts that jump from here to there. Another translation says “double-minded” (NRSV), Amplified reads, “undecided [in religion]”. But Peterson’s Message Bible paraphrases, “I hate the two-faced”

 James assured that the “double-minded man is unstable in all his ways” (James 1:8). David spoke of those who flatter with their lips and speak “with a double heart” (Psalm 12:2) Half and half is not a coffee creamer, it is a covenantal schizophrenia. The half and half lives somewhere between saint and ain’t. He tries to thumb a ride down both sides of the road at once without any clear destination in mind. There is no way to be happy with halfway. halfway leads to misery.Jesus told the Laodicean church, “If you’re not sold out you’ll be spewed out!” (Revelation 3:16) In other words choose sides. In Bible days that meant you either believed in Saul or you believed in David. Its God that draws the plumb-line to get us off the fence-line.No straddling the fence,it could be really bad for the groin.

 “I hate men who are half and half”. I hear some say “I’m not conservative or liberal. I'm a moderate.I weigh each issue and am somewhere in between”.Homosexual marriage,Gay rights,abortion these are the issues that are splitting churches today as well as society. While some attempt to kow-tow to both sides by remaining passive and uninvolved.Try that in a football game sometime. Try playing for both teams and see how banged up you get. I’m not saying there is no room for grace, of course there is. But some issues are by definition polarizing. Dancing around issues, trying to find a moderate pulse on things like abortion, gay marriage is not taking a side.Admittedly,the truth of God's word is not always pretty,even to some Christians I know. Whatever we’re going to do let’s do it but please don’t make the mistake of trying to be "Two Faced or half and half”. To us Jesus should be Lord of all if He is going to be Lord of any. That requires decisiveness then corresponding action.Believing is more about our behaviour than just our words.(Mark 16.16) Otherwise the blend is somewhere between room temperature coffee and warm diet Pepsi.Get ready to be spewed......... Yuck!

Nuff Said,